Don't think what you do is important because the audience forgets you as soon as they walk out the door
This is similar to what we talked about before, but it needs to be talked about here again because once you accept it, it will change the what you worry about.
You see in the example of me dropping the ball, I truly do not worry that I have somehow ruined my entire routine. I have gone onstage with my mind already made up that I am going to have a good time with the audience. So in the grand scheme of things, what's a dropped ball, or a wrongly called card, going to matter in the way people remember my act. I'm hoping they remember me and my showmanship skills more.
Always remember that if you mess something up, the world keeps turning and your dog will lick you when you get home and still be your best friend.
If you think the audience will rush home from your performance and loudly tell their family that you messed up a trick, and then they in turn facebook the story to their friends, then sadly, it's my duty to tell you that you are wrong: you may be feeling that you are more important than you really are.
I don't say that in a nasty way because we all like to think well of
ourselves, but in the context of battling nerves before a performance, it's critical that we get it out in the open. And you may be important in other areas of your life, but I don't know of any magician, present or past, who I would class as a game changer in the history of the world.
I'm not saying that I don't care if I make mistakes. I do. I try to be as professional and well rehearsed as possible. What I don't do is let that fear of failure rule my life any more.
Keep it in perspective and you are already on the way to reducing those shake attacks. You should always feel a tightness in your stomach, though. That will help keep you sharp. Strangely you will tend to make
If you are doing a
more errors if you lose those pre show jitters. That is usually a sign that you are over it, you feel no challenge anymore. Time to go get another job.
Remember too that it's not just magicians who get the shakes. Anyone who has to stand up in front of an audience and deliver anything, suffers them too. But magic carries the extra burden that we have challenged our audience, by implicitly saying we will try and trick them. After all, everyone is TRYING to catch you out. It comes with the territory.
But what if there was nothing for them to catch you out on. What if you had some tricks that required next to no technical mastery, and instead you put your personality to good use. What if you had a sure fire way of getting people to stop and watch you, and you also had ways of making them laugh. Then, to top it off, you had a smooth way of finishing and moving on. I bet you'd be feeling more confident then! More about this later.
Right now here's one easy way to get more confidence ...
Julian's Rule #7:
If there are tricks that make you nervous when you perform them, stop performing them.To be fair, this is something I read in Eugene Burger's terrific book called Mastering The Art Of Magic, but I live by this rule and have adopted it as my own. http://www.birthday-party-magician.com/eugene-burger.html
If any of the tricks you are performing make you nervous because the moves are too hard, or your hands are the wrong size, or it is too wordy and you can't remember the script, then STOP doing them.
Put them to one side and come back to them later. If it's a good trick, it will be timeless. Tricks don't have a use by date. I have always found
something peculiar happens when ...
I do this. the trick that had been giving me all the grief has suddenly become easier to do. All that muscle memory you have built up doesn't just vanish. It seems to reorganise itself.
Part of what is happening of course, is that by choosing less challenging material, your time in front of audiences gives you a huge boost to your confidence. You start to relax. Remember easier tricks doesn't mean 'less entertaining' tricks.
When you are not confident, your nervous body gives off all the wrong signals, and these happen subconsciously. The opposite occurs when you are relaxed, your personality shines through without you even knowing it.
Confidence will come through experience, and that experience will come once you start getting in front of people with your tricks.
Let's have a quick recap:
Be realistic and start with 3 short easy tricks
Remember, it's just magic tricks, not life and death
Perform magic you find enjoyable and comfortable with
How's it going so far? Making sense to you? Are you feeling inspired?
We haven't even got to the good stuff yet.
Remember, my aim here is to convince you that you are good enough to start performing magic earlier in your career, than later.
In this respect I am out of touch with most of the conventional thinking in the teaching of magic. The traditional way is an informal
apprenticeship scheme. You would search out a magician and just keep hanging around them enough to show them you were keen to learn.
They would feed you bits and pieces of knowledge, tell you watch and learn, and then, MAYBE, you would be good enough one day.
I say you are good enough now, because many of you, especially adults, possess something much more valuable, and that's the inherent life skills you already have. What I am offering you is a small bag of tools that you can use to rearrange a lot of that existing confidence into a launching pad for a new magic career, whether it is part or full time.
Maybe magic for pure entertainment is not for you.
Maybe you want to use it to:
illustrate points in your work
be an aid to teaching (something I do a lot of)
entertain the kids in the restaurant because the boss told you to
help you lift your conference speech above boring
you are a doctor and need something to settle anxious patients
There seem to be some fairly standard paths people come along when they are investigating the possibility of magic being a part of their lives.
Do you see yourself in one of these?
Younger Person you develop an interest in tricks – you possess drive and passion and time but never perform because you are young and have no confidence – you wait to attain life skills and confidence as you get older – by then you have lost interest
Working Adult you develop an interest in tricks later in life or rekindle a passion from your youth - you have next to no time available but you have the advantage of confidence that comes with age - it all becomes too hard and you settle for doing some party tricks
Retired Person you develop an interest in tricks because you want to entertain the grandkids - you have a huge advantage of time to apply yourself, but the disadvantage of that time is in short supply - you believe you are too old and settle on tricks for the grandkids
What the 3 examples share in common is that there is little magic at the end of the journey.
Welcome to my way:
You already have a personality worth far more than you think - you gain confidence using easy tricks - earn money - you develop a real interest in magic and how it can continue to make your life richer in many ways.
I believe that ...
If you WANT to be a magician you WILL be one.
If you have read any of my motivational writings you will know that I don’t subscribe to any form of team building psycho babble, where you have to look in the mirror and make positive affirmations to yourself.
I really dislike that sort of stuff.
But boy, this is really the nub of it. If you WANT to be a magician you WILL be one. You have just got to want it bad enough. You would need to be suffering a fairly major disability to not be in the running. Whether you aim to be a full time or part time magician, you can still be professional, if in nothing but your approach.
Should you have trouble with speech or vocalising your thoughts, there is silent magic. Are you wheelchair bound? Legs are the least useful limb to a magician (unless you are bad and have to run away a lot.) How about those with little or no use of their hands? For you there is
mentalism. If you have general use of all your movements and faculties then magic is a smorgasbord of possibilities. It's exciting isn't it?
You just have to want this bad enough and you will find a way to make it all work.